jpinard
1848
I might be missing something, but is there a research field that helps you with cosmite? I’m perpetually out of it.
There are several in the social tree that unlock buildings that produce Cosmite in your capital. Basically 100% of your expansion decisions should relate to how to get more Cosmite. There are deposits on the map that generate +5 a turn.
They are along the Colony Infrastructure line I think.
It’s an intentionally rare research. You want to seek out nodes on the map and claim them, in addition to @MisterMourning’s excellent tip about finding ways to improve your stock in the tech tree. By the end-end game you will be able to bring in quite a lot, but it’s a critical resource for most of a given match.
jpinard
1851
OK I’m redoing my campaign map because I was just taking over what was next to me with no borders and none of them had cosmite.
- How does decide what the central structure should be?
- What do you all like to do about the Paragon factions? Keep them around, wipe them out?
- When you come across a sector that you really like/want and someone else has a claim on it who needs to be a friend, do you still have leeway to take it?
- How do you heal on the campaign map? Is it a bit over each game turn? Do you heal faster in home territory vs. enemy territory?
Thanks for the help!
See I have no idea how much this hurts my diplomatic stance with them…
Also, why are there two different symbols for “unidentified forces”?
KevinC
1852
Yes, the AI cheats in that regard and has full map vision at all times, with the exception that it cannot see invisible units. It’s one of my few remaining gripes in the series.
Thing is it doesn’t really matter, the map vision I mean, because you can get almost full map vision quite easily, via monitoring stations.
Also, the AI will attack vulnerable things, but in this game you have far fewer vulnerable things than you did in Aow3.
In Aow3 the AI would send a scout or 2 to your back line and snipe your cities.
Here, the same thing requires a proper army, which you’ll notice long before it arrives.
So yes, it does see stuff, but it matters less.
Also, I think it is coded to ignore invisible stuff and actually all your armies until it gets “proper” vision.
I say this based off observation that I can mass an army, say if 3 stacks, and bring it forward and elicit no reaction until I am at the borders.
Given that my main army producing city tends to be my capital, my borders are frequently 3 or 4 turns away.
Also, I’ve observed AI seemingly catch other AI by surprise.
It knows where your cities are though.
There’s no one solution here.
I look at the neighbouring sectors and identify the landmarks, especially the one controlled by the NPCs.
So if the Paragon are sitting on a production landmark, I plan ahead to have that as my 2nd or 3rd sector, so I’ll make my central building a production one, and want that city to have 2 production and 1 energy sector, for unit discounts.
This will be my army factory.
I pander to them shamelessly, as I like their units and mods.
Claim it anyway send them a bribe.
Plus 6 hp per turn standard.
Extra (+6 I think) in friendly territory, including forward bases.
Plus army leaders (heroes) have some regen skills.
5 cassus belli means tepid war support. +200 morale when you fight.
10 means popular. +400 morale.
15 means high approval. +600 morale.
I’d need to check the figures. I’m going off memory.
Regarding the Paragon, they’ll give you plenty of opportunity to erase the insult of claiming their land.
Bottom left means force of unknown composition, known to be hostile.
Right means unknown, not known if hostile or not, iirc
Piemax2
1860
I’m in the same boat, so far I’ve only finished a small one.
jpinard
1861
Wow thanks a ton @BloodyBattleBrain !
KevinC
1862
Of course it matters, otherwise they wouldn’t still have the cheat. It’s true that It’s less bad here than in AOW3, though.
But here’s the rub for me: you say the player easily gets vision via things like monitoring stations. The AI has access to those very same tools, and that’s exactly why they shouldn’t have this crutch anymore. Monitoring stations have a cost and the have counters, there’s gameplay associated with them. You also might be able to eventually establish decent coverage, but that takes time. Meanwhile at Turn 1 the AI knows exactly where you are and knows precisely when you just moved forces away to deal with another AI player or whatever. If they worked with monitoring stations, they’d have to first extend their network that far out and they can be effectively countered by cheap flyers with detection.
I vaguely remember back in the early Aow3 days hearing that it doesn’t have this as an enabled cheat.
It’s something to do with all non player units being linked somehow.
It came down to some coding issue.
I said it doesn’t really matter because you can still surprise the AI and bait it out of position.
So this uber vision they apparently have doesn’t seem to be doing much for them, and much less so than in Aow3.
I think the constant and never ending demands in order to keep this “pandering” afloat gets old and needs to be dialed back a notch.
It does not add to the flavor of a campaign to have the fish and paragon hammering you with requests literally every other turn.
They exist as additional element to the campaign map, to add another wrinkle, so here’s an obvious observation about seasoning: it’s not supposed to be over done or it distracts from the dish.
Exactly. And my decision to take the long route to a city in order to avoid detection adds an additional element to a campaign, just as my decision on whether to burn energy to monitor my borders is a piece of my puzzle of options with trade offs that I decide about every turn.
Can’t really agree with the idea the AI shouldn’t have to do the same thing.
This seems like a good time to restate my position that having the AI play by the same rules as humans is a good recipe for some deeply subpar AI. Screw it, let 'em cheat, just don’t make it flagrantly noticeable.
I mean, as I’ve said before, the best route is just to give them a completely different game to play, but failing that…
My request isn’t exact same rules, it’s more to this specific point, why allow the AI to see the entire map and units when there are avenues of research and the use of scouts to accomplish the same damn thing the human is doing to accomplish this task.
